The present invention relates to a grid system for laying out and/or precutting tiles or the like. More particularly, the present invention relates to such a system in which it is possible to select in advance the best possible arrangement of ceiling, floor or wall tiles and to enable exact determination of the proper amounts of such tile as will be needed and the proper cutting of such tiles without having to measure each individual tile unit to the surface to be covered.
This invention relates to a grid system which will enable an installer of covering units, such as floor, wall or ceiling tiles, to determine with accuracy the best arrangement of such tiles for pleasing appearance, and to further enable the exact determination in advance of the number of tiles or covering units which will be needed and the amount and nature of the cutting of such tiles. In the past, there was no known system for obtaining such information. In general, a person about to install such tiles, such as ceiling tiles, had to estimate what might be the best layout of such tiles. Usually this involved some mental gymnastics, an educated guess and possibly some calculations with respect to the surface to be covered and the size of the tiles to be put therein. However, even with all of this having been done, no picture could be created as to what the ultimate arrangement of the tiles would look like. This is true whether the tiles to be laid were floor tiles, wall tiles or ceiling tiles. However, as is known with respect to the mounting of ceiling tiles, it is usually necessary to construct an arrangement for holding the tiles to the ceiling. One such common structural arrangement in wide use today is that of a metal hanger arrangement comprised of main "T" hanger elements and cross-pieces. The exact location of the main hangers and cross-hangers or supports had to be determined in advance of installing any of the ceiling tiles. This of course presents a troublesome situation in that a very substantial amount, if not all, of the work is done before the installer is able to observe the resulting pattern of the tiles and the amount of cutting that had to be done to install the ceiling tiles. By use of the present invention, such an arrangement may be predetermined and the location of the main "T"'s and cross-hangers may be marked on a layout of the ceiling without trial and error, without mental gymnastics and without detailed calculations. Furthermore, various arrangements may be tried by merely moving a transparent sheet having a grid thereon representing the tiles with ease and simplicity. Furthermore, in accordance with the present invention, all of this may be accomplished very inexpensively.
It has been known in the past to use scaled gridded layouts in which models representing pieces of equipment, appliances, furniture and landscape items, such as trees and shrubbery, and the like were placed on a grid network to provide an indication of a possible layout of such items on a floor plan or landscape. For example, these types of teachings are shown in the following United States Pat. Nos.: 2,610,413--Dasey; 2,878,586--Ohlsson; 2,127,047--Pinney; 3,012,336--Brown; and 2,526,569--Lewis et al. None of the prior art references disclose a grid system for optimally arranging and laying out floor, wall or ceiling covering units such as tiles or the like wherein such covering units may be optimally arranged over a representation of the surface to be covered and in which the exact number of tile units may be counted and the proper cutting of such covering units may be determined before application to the surface to be covered.